Wednesday, July 20, 2011

What do these results mean? Not allowed to tell you
By Andrew Orlowski

The chief of the world’s leading physics lab at CERN in Geneva has prohibited scientists from drawing conclusions from a major experiment. The CLOUD (”Cosmics Leaving Outdoor Droplets”) experiment examines the role that energetic particles from deep space play in cloud formation. CLOUD uses CERN’s proton synchrotron to examine nucleation.

CERN Director General Rolf-Dieter Heuer told Welt Online that the scientists should refrain from drawing conclusions from the latest experiment.

“I have asked the colleagues to present the results clearly, but not to interpret them,” reports veteran science editor Nigel Calder on his blog. Why?

Because, Heuer says, “That would go immediately into the highly political arena of the climate change debate. One has to make clear that cosmic radiation is only one of many parameters.”

The unusual “gagging order” could have been issued because the results of CLOUD are really, really boring, muses Calder. Or, it could be that the experiment invites a politically unacceptable hypothesis on climate.

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Well, certain elements of the press do, all of a sudden, and, lo and behold, after years of demonizing Ronald Reagan as a fiscally irresponsible tax-cutter, they are now trying to resurrect the Gipper as a tax increaser.

…

It’s so absurd it’s almost funny. If ordinary Americans remember President Reagan as a tax-cutter rather than a tax-raiser, it’s not because they are victims of some kind of elaborate deception perpetrated by the Great Communicator. It’s because President Reagan, well, cut tax rates.

Even the left-leaning web site Slate didn’t buy the 1982-biggest-peacetime-tax-increase in history line when it was used against one of its congressional creators, Sen. Robert Dole, in the 1996 presidential campaign. Slate said, “most of Dole’s tax increase was actually the partial repeal of future tax cuts that had been enacted in 1981 but had not yet taken place. Despite Dole’s bill, taxpayers received more than $375 billion in tax cuts over the following three years… Almost $50 billion of Dole’s 1982 projected revenue was supposed to come from cracking down on tax cheats, by adding staff to the IRS, and requiring financial institutions to withhold interest and dividends the way employers withhold wages. (This provision was repealed the next year, before it could take effect.) Is getting people to pay taxes they already owe but would otherwise escape a ‘tax increase’?”

Thursday, July 14, 2011

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Christian Lopez has been praised and excoriated for handing over Derek Jeter’s 3,000th hit ball.

The Tax Man won’t be that generous. The 23-year old cell phone salesman will likely owe thousands to the IRS due to the pricey seats the Yankees gave him as a reward, according to the New York Daily News.

Lopez already owes about $100,000 in student loans. But after catching the Jeter homer he handed the ball off to the Yankee star with no strings attached.